By Heresies Distressed

Safehold Series, Book 3

By: David Weber

Narrated by: Jason Culp

Length: 24 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

In David Weber's By Heresies Distressed, the battle for the soul of the planet Safehold has begun.

The Kingdom of Charis and the Kingdom of Chisholm have joined together, pledged to stand against the tyranny of a corrupt Church. The youthful Queen Sharleyan of Chisholm has wed King Cayleb of Charis, forging a single dynasty, a single empire, dedicated to the defense of human freedom. Crowned Empress of that empire, Sharleyan has found in Cayleb's arms the love she never dared hope for in a "marriage of state." In Cayleb's cause, his defiance of the ruthless Group of Four who govern mother Church, she has found the task to which she can commit her mind and her courage. It is a cause for which she was born.

Yet there are things Sharleyan still does not know. Secrets Cayleb has not been permitted to share, even with her. Secrets like the true story of humanity on Safehold. Like the intricate web of lies, deception, and fabricated "religion" which have chained humanity for almost a thousand years. Like the existence of the genocidal alien Gbaba, waiting to complete mankind's destruction should humans ever attract their attention once more. Like the existence of a young woman, Nimue Alban, nine hundred years dead, whose heart, mind, and memories live on within the android body of the warrior-monk she knows as Merlin.

And so Empress Sharleyan faces the great challenge of her life unaware of all that task truly entails...or of how the secrets the man who loves her cannot share may threaten all they have achieved between them...and her own life.

Listen to more in the Safehold series.

©2009 David Weber (P)2009 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“From the clean, enunciated tones of Merlin, to the faint Scottish accent of Cayleb, to the gruff and terse voice of Grand Inquisitor Clintan, Culp manages to convey a distinct identity through tone, pitch, accent and speech patterns of each character.” —KingoftheNerds.com

“The unabridged audiobook version of By Heresies Distressed...is masterfully narrated by Jason Culp. The excitement and tension of dramatic events...come across even more strongly to a listener than to a reader.” —BookLoons.com

Comes across as written too rapidly

I really enjoyed Armageddon Reef and I think the characters, the world and its dilemmas that Weber has invented are compelling. The writing of novels 2 and 3 is not up to that of the first book, however. If the author mentions a character giving a "crooked smile" one more time, I'm going to scream. He must have used that phrase at least 100 times in this book alone. The new narrator's choice of voices is not up to the standards of the voices used by the narrator of the first two books. He obviously didn't listen to the first narrator at all. The story is still compelling, but the overall feel of this book is that Weber is sloppily cranking the rest of the series out.

A Must for the Safehold Fan!

Love this, well written and well read, though I'd preferred that the same reader of the previous two books had continued this reader, Jason Culp, wasn't too bad and in fact made the story very, very interesting. Join in the fun and continue the story of the fight against a false church that's trying to destroy an innocent land.

narrator is annoying.

Why would he give people native to the tropics an Irish accent? His other voices are all very similar to each other.

Love This Series !!!

this is a great series David has created. part sci-fi part fantasy but ALL good!

Narrator change hurts this book

Very hard to get used to the fact that characters you've listened to for almost 50 hours (books 1 and 2) now sound drastically different.

Liked the series, but...

Why did they change readers? The accents were sort of goofy in the third book. I really enjoyed the reader in the first two books - I was used to the characters and their voices added to their overall persona. I had to give it 4 stars due to the change in reader - Jason Culp does a nice job reading the book, but the change really threw me for a loop within the first 2 minutes. I thought I had purchased the wrong book!

Great Book! But not the best.

I wouldn't say I had a hard time finishing this book but it definitely did drag on at times. There are definitely some intense battles, but the majority of this book is world building and deals with politics. I honestly just wanted to hear more about Merlin and Caleb's adventures more than anything.

Charis always wins

They win nearly every battle and get all the breaks. Kinda gets old. Doesn't need thousands of pages to describe.

Is David Weber Getting Paid by the Word?

This book is the third installment in the Safehold series, and is actually substantially shorter than the preceding title, "By Schism Rent Asunder." Still, I find the author to be indulging a penchant for excessive dialog. Perhaps "wildly excessive" would be more accurate.

The story is driven almost entirely by dialog, both internal and external. This is a story of war (and political intrigue), and Weber seems to have adopted the view that his writing should provide long stretches of boredom punctuated by brief moments of action. Despite the best efforts of the narrator, almost all of the conversations and internal dialogs seem to drag on far too long.

Compared with much of Weber's earlier work, his efforts here at character development are appreciated, but it would be nice if the characters would occasionally get to the freakin' point! After listening to this book, I am of the impression that Weber was obliged to produce it (perhaps on a deadline), but had a very skimpy plot outline to work with. He seems to have fleshed out the narrative with a lot of overwrought and unnecessary verbiage.

I would like to note that the narrator (Jason Culp) has changed since the first two books in this series. Those titles were narrated by Oliver Wyman. Apparently, Culp makes some effort to mimic the voices and accents portrayed by Wyman, with mixed and unsatisfactory results.

If you have read (and thoroughly enjoyed) the preceding books in this series, this one is probably worth enduring. But I have my doubts as to whether I will be purchasing the next one. I hope that David Weber will wrap up this series in the next book or two. Personally, I find this entire bastard sub-genre of science/historical fiction to be quickly growing tiresome.

Oliver Wyman vs Jason Culp. Sorry Jason.

Would you listen to By Heresies Distressed again? Why?

Not until it's re-recorded (if ever!) by Oliver Wyman.

What three words best describe Jason Culp’s voice?

He's a good reader but not as good as Oliver Wyman. Can't stand the accent he chose for Caleb, a poor Scottish Burr that make the Emperor sound unintelligent.